


Old Flame

by IdolDaydreams



Series: 50 Prompts Personal Challenge [7]
Category: B.A.P
Genre: Angst, F/M, M/M, Other, Reader-Insert
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-07
Updated: 2016-11-07
Packaged: 2018-08-29 15:50:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 433
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8496145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IdolDaydreams/pseuds/IdolDaydreams
Summary: He gave you up for his career, then his career came back to bite him. Meanwhile, you’re stuck in limbo.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



You hadn’t seen him in person in years. You no longer had the right to check on him. Yet after the lawsuit broke and he released _AM 4:44_ , you were compelled to watch. All the anger and sadness in it gripped your heart like a vice. Barely a verse in and you were sobbing. His black silhouette blurred with your scorching tears. This. This was what he had traded you for. A parting that had been so dramatic, such romantic martyrdom at the time, then seemed so stupid. You no longer wanted to be the elder of the nursing home who, with a bony, quaking finger, told all the nurses you had dated a celebrity. You no longer wanted to be able to shock their humoring, condescending nods into stillness. The story wasn’t worth it if he didn’t get to have his happy ending.

As soon as the song ended, you grabbed your phone. You wanted to call Yongnam. You wanted to call Natasha. Anyone who knew him, anyone who could tell you if he was okay. Instead you put it down. To contact them then, you felt like an opportunist. A vulture preying on his moment of weakness. You couldn’t let yourself be that person. So, you stayed silent. You took his final, “Everything’s gonna be all right,” to heart. Yongguk could take care of himself. He didn’t need you.

Maybe he never did.

In the following days and weeks, you began to question if you ever knew him. Yongguk had his moods, to be sure, but the emotional firestorm of his performance was alien to you. While he had spoken from the heart, he had done so with quiet sincerity. His words had been gentle and affirming. He had never been angry – at least not about anything you couldn’t fix. The more you questioned, the more you tried to put him out of your mind. The more you tried, the more you couldn’t.

Now you find yourself frequenting his old haunts: the tattoo parlor, the café, the restaurant where you spent so many evenings. You don’t expect to find him there. More, it’s an attempt at taking comfort in the familiar. However, none of these places are familiar to you. The parlor added a new artist. The café took your favorite item off the menu. The restaurant changed its décor. Rather than a nostalgic visitor, you’re an apparition. Eternally searching for the person you left behind, cloaking passersby in an uneasy chill.

The romantic martyrdom these days seems more like desertion, and you can no longer tell who deserted who.


End file.
